The operation of a circuit design of an electronic system may be predicted by simulation. A simulation of a circuit design may be used to predict the operation of the circuit design prior to implementing the system in hardware. The simulation may predict the operation from a description of the circuit design in a hardware description language (HDL), and the simulation may provide a time sequence of values for every output and every internal signal of the circuit design when given a particular time sequence of values of stimuli for the inputs of the circuit design. The response of the circuit design may be predicted for various input scenarios by respective simulations.
During the development of a circuit design, a designer may examine the predicted operation provided by simulations of various scenarios to discover unintended behavior. Unintended behavior is typically exposed by a symptom that occurs somewhat later in simulation time than the cause of the unintended behavior. A designer may use the signal values generated by the logic simulation to trace backwards in simulation time from the symptom of a defect to the cause of a defect.
Simulation is invaluable to discover and fix defects in a circuit design prior to implementing the circuit design in hardware. Execution speed is an important characteristic of a simulation because execution speed may determine how long a designer has to wait for the results for a scenario. The execution speed may also limit the number scenarios that may be attempted. Another important characteristic of a simulation is accuracy in predicting the actual behavior exhibited when the circuit design is implemented in hardware.
The present invention may address one or more of the above issues.